Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Art.net

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result of the debate was keep. Thryduulf 15:32, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Art.Net

Page was originally nominated for a speedy and then changed to a prod by Samuel Blanning. Was then deprodded by 71.141.135.76 claiming that it met notability because of awards listed at http://www.art.net/about/awards.html. However, all of these awards date back to 1996, a time when the internet was in a much more infantile stage, and awards had much less significance. Furthermore, all of these awards appear to be of dubious significance, none of them are listed in Category:Awards and some of them are vague such as "Top 5% of all Web Sites"

When the article was originally created I assumed good faith in that it could be cleaned up and kept regardless of its notability, however it's creator Art.net and other anonymous users (whom I suspect are the same) continue to remove {{fact}} tags (without citing anything), insert numerous links to the website into the article, and make other changes that turn the article into nothing more than a blatant advertisement. --Hetar 08:52, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Isn't it true that {{fact}} and {{citation needed}}, which replaced the deleted fact tag are the same? --James S. 10:27, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Sure, those two tags are simillar, but edits like [1] where the fact tag was replaced with an edit summary of "its true" are what I was talking about. --Hetar 16:38, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Please note that the requested citations are provided. --James S. 21:13, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

• Delete: per my statements above. --Hetar 08:52, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
• Delete nn website. Alexa ranks of about 77,000. Majority of sites that reference art.net seem to be artists on the site. As per hetar - may have been notable 10 years ago, it isn't now. Kcordina ^Talk 09:55, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
• Strong Keep Meets notability criteria: audience of more than 5,000 per day (about 3X), shares philosophy with wikis, and independently notable as art history of the world wide web. I know the site maintainer, who asked me to help address the concerns. The article is better with in-line links, at least until Noncommercial is written. --James S. 10:23, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. With the award list in the article, the website does seem to meet, or at least comes close to meeting point 2 of WP:WEB. Sjakkalle (Check!) 13:42, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
• Keep per Sjakkalle. Monicasdude 14:02, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

• Keep. Notable website. Stev0 18:08, 27 March 2006 (UTC)
• Strong Keep . art.net's page is worth keeping for at least two reasons.

1) It's history as one of the earliest art sites, one of the earliest cooperative sites on the Internet, and a site that has encouraged people who are not artists to produce art, and post it on the WWW.

2) More importantly, it's courageous participation with the ACLU in defending freedom of speech on the Internet. These are acts of public citizenship of the highest order and should be cited in wikipedia. As acts within and from the Internet community, they are one of the earliest examples of a web site doing so. These acts are similar to those of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the League for Programming Freedom, the GNU Project, the Free Software Foundation, among others.

Wikipedia promotes itself on each of it's pages. And explicitly asks for donations in TWO places on most pages. How is this different then what little self-promotion there is in this art.net page?

I suggest wikipedia err on the side of inclusivity, and delete pages rarely.

Who I am: I've been involved with the Internet and it's predecessors for four decades. I remember what the ARPAnet was like when it was less then 255 sites (and the transitions to larger address spaces). And many of the disputes that have occurred along the way. What mailing lists should be allowed. What USENET newsgroups should be allowed. Working with rabbit, chuq, et al in defining what USENET netiquette should be. Etc. Reviewing and improving RFCs who numbers had only three digits in them, and the 100th (3 digits ;-) web site, and seeing both efforts grow. Etc.

BTW, I helped rms write the GNU Free Documentation License (which wikipedia uses) as well as the GPL, GLPL, etc. as a Director of the Free Software Foundation from it's start for a decade plus [2] [3].

Disclaimer: I've supported art.net since it's earliest days. And am one of the creative software shapers it encouraged to also be an artist. As an Internet activist, I encouraged it's work with the ACLU.

best -len Lentower 09:58, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Note:- User's first edit

• keep Notable website. Nigelthefish 15:48, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
• Delete Per Hetar (Note that an Alexa rating of 77,000 does not equate to an audience of over 5,000 uniques per day in my experience, let alone 14,000 as claimed in the article - is this fact verified? Should probably have {{fact}} added to tht claim) _{§τοĿĿ€Ŗγ}^Ť_č 09:07, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Note Art.Net runs Apache which generates nightly logs that show the number of unique hosts visiting the site on the previous day as well as the number of full HTML pages viewed during that same period. The numbers quoted in the article were dated the day before this article was first created on wikipedia.org. Am not sure how we would post the results as proof on the page... Do you really want logs on article pages? We can do it if needed to prove the point... Art.net 01:34, 29 March 2006 (PST)

Followup to Note above The access reports for Art.Net just came in for yesterday (Mar 28 2006) and show that on that day Art.Net received a total of 64,540 html page views made by 9272 unique hosts. The total number of accesses (minus errors) was 187,732 which were made by 15,610 unique hosts. These numbers are pretty consistant on weekdays. Art.net 03:22, 29 March 2006 (PST)

Alexa is somewhat biased towards IE users in the US willing to install snoopware, and that may explain the discrepancy with this site's users' typical freedom-oriented international privacy advocate stance. --James S. 21:16, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

• Keep per User:Sjakkalle, now that the article is cleaned up. The CDA battle was a very big deal for internet freedom at the time. Disclosure: I also know the folks who run this site. Phr 10:15, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Strong Keep Art.Net has been a vital part of extending the fight for Internet liberty both to the arts community and beyond the borders of the United States. John Perry Barlow

Note: Users only edit. Kcordina ^Talk 13:29, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Also note that if this user is in fact who he claims to be, John Perry Barlow, his opinion is strong, substantive, and independent evidence of notability, not just a "vote" here. Monicasdude 13:53, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

• Keep: Art.net is one of the oldest, if not the oldest art web sites on the internet. Given that fictional characters from video games seem to merit their own pages on wikipedia, I can hardly see any problem with an entry for a non-commercial site of such historical significance. Edward A. Falk, 20:15, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

ETA: I see a conflict in the objections to the web page. Some people complain about too many links into art.net (I've asked Lile to tone this down), but others complain about lack of citations. How should this be resolved?

• Keep The above arguments for the relevance of free-speech history are quite persuasive. Also, 450 artists in one place seems noteworthy. Quoting from Wikipedia policy: If in doubt, don't delete. And with regard to the comment above, suggesting that the anonymous contributors are the same person as Art.net: Remember to please always assume good faith. Disclosure: I know art.net's webmaster. Cphoenix 22:52, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

• Keep Art.net represents all the good things that the Internet aspires to be – freedom, community, mutual support and most of all social entrepreneurship. Art.net is a NOT-for-profit entity, which helps artists show their work. As such, it is essential that Wikipedia, a new source of knowledge and cultural history, recognize the value of art communities like Art.net...Lile Elam, the founder of Art.net, is a recognized leader in the realm of civil rights, cyberspace and a social entrepreneurship. She has donated her time and energy to supporting ACLU struggles to protect freedom. She has turned her technical and creative acumen into an online gallery for artists around the world. Her story and the story of Art.net deserve to be documented. --Tamara Colby 00:42, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

• Keep. The free-speech and legal history make this site notable, and it was a very early site in the history of the web. I don't see that it's worth fighting about. It does no harm, and doesn't misrepresent itself. --Bill Woodcock

• Keep. --Don Lindsay

Note:Users first edit.

• Keep. Agree with most of the positive statements above. Art.net is a part of the web. It belongs in wikipedia. --FenLabalme 08:49, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

• Keep Moe ε 02:22, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

• Strong Keep As an artist, I feel that Art.Net is an important and notable site on the Internet and WWWeb. It is a place where artists can share freely, without fear. It is a place where artists can take a stand and say,
  "Yes, I believe in the freedom of choice, the freedom to be free, and the freedom to share!"
  It is a site that deserves to be known and shared.
  It is a place where freedom can be born, to blossom and grow. It is a ship, a water shead, a safe harbor, a place of hope... a shining light in the dark night guiding us to new and better ways of being. May we always shine bright and be here to light a candle for all of those who are in the dark! Forever and ever and always... Blessed Be! --lile 11:59, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

• Keep Meets WP:WEB. Historical website with 10+ year history. Also I believe this is a bad-faith nom. If Hetar believed that the article should exist "regardless of notability", then they seem to be bringing it to WP:AFD as "punishment" for the fact that they do not like the POV or other editing conflicts going on, rather than talking those out and improving the article. KWH 19:24, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

Published Testimony for Art.Net

Declaration of Lile Elam in ALA v. Pataki (3/19/1997) In this published testimony, an explaination is given as to why Art.Net was concerned about being prosecuted by New York's CDA law. --Art.net 10:24, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Art.Net Statement in ACLU v. Johnson: The Challenge to New Mexico's Online Censorship Law (June 1998) --Art.net 10:24, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Art.Net's Complaint in ACLU v. Johnson Concerning Online Censorship in New Mexico (4/22/1998) --Art.net 10:24, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Testimony of Rudolf Kinsky (note: poorly formated and dificult to read) An artist member of Art.Net, Kinsky was living in New York City when the NY-CDA law was passed. Kinsky removed art from his Art.Net studio because of fear of persecution. He said he had come to America from Europe because freedom of speech was protected here and he could create and share his art without fear. In his homeland, such freedoms do not always exist. Because of the passage of this law, Kinsky felt that this freedom no lnoger existed for him in NY.--Art.net 10:24, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Artists Exhibit of Art Subject to Censorship when Internet censorship laws are enacted. While this exhibit is hosted on Art.Net, it contains personal works of art that were voluntarilly contributed by member artists of Art.Net who thought that these works might be censored by such laws. --Art.net 10:24, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Copied to Talk:Art.Net. --James S. 19:40, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.